BY MTHANDAZO NYONI
EVERY year, Zimbabwe’s auditor-general (AG) Mildred Chiri, releases damning reports, exposing a litany of gross accounting malpractices by government departments, parastatals and local authorities.
To address these malpractices, Chiri usually gives recommendations but the majority of them are not being implemented by public officials, resulting in re-occurrence of similar or identical irregularities.
For instance, according to the AG 2019 report, out of the 356 recommendations made by the AG in 2018, only 26% were fully implemented, 25% partially implemented and 49% were not implemented at all.
The same trend can be witnessed from the 435 recommendations made in 2017 where 25% were fully implemented; 19% partially implemented and 56% not implemented at all.
In a presentation during a recent public finance auditing virtual training workshop organised by the Cultural Information Trust (CIT), public finance expert Stevenson Dhlamini said there were no enforcement mechanisms compelling public officials to implement audit recommendations.
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“There is lack of commitment in the implementation of audit reports in Zimbabwe, a situation, which is negatively affecting the operations of public organisations in the country,” Dhlamini said.
“The enabling legislation is that both the constitution and the Audit Office Act do not avail to the AG powers to compel and make it mandatory for ministers and government departments to observe and comply with the instructions of the treasury.”
He pointed out that some government ministers deliberately failed to produce returns and statements required for audit chiefly because of the culture of impunity.
Dhlamini said political appointments in most of Zimbabwe’s parastatals remained the chief reason why state entities were not cooperating and failing to submit returns to the AG.
“The Zimbabwean public sector is very much politicised as evidenced by the presence of exmilitants serving as parastatals’ bosses and as a result these have been regarded as retirement zones,” he said.
“Public sector politicisation has two main effects to sound public sector auditing and the first one is that it erodes the sense of obligation to comply with the regulations and the second one is that it reduces the auditorgeneral’s effectiveness in the exercise of his or her duties by inducing fear to objectively scrutinise these entities precisely because those at the helm are politically connected.”
Due to lack of enforcement mechanisms, Dhlamini said there had been re-occurrence of similar or identical irregularities in most government ministries as well as state entities as matters or audit reports were swept under the carpet.
“Such a scenario is a clear indication that observations of the auditor general and recommendations are not being implemented at all,” he said.
He said the law does not provide enforcement mechanisms with regard to audit recommendations and this impacts a negatively on the ability of the audit office in producing the annual reports as well as meeting statutory deadlines for tabling of such reports in Parliament.
Dhlamini said audit recommendations must state a clear, convincing, and workable basis for implementation.
He added that their continued relevance should be reevaluated as follow up actions progress.
“Auditors and organisations must be committed to identifying and bringing about needed change,” Dhlamini said.
“The auditor’s commitment should be personal and professional.
“The organisation should be supportive and reinforce the commitment to its staff.”
He pointed out that organisations should have a system that provides the structure of discipline needed to promote action on audit recommendations.
“It should ensure that recommendations are aggressively pursued until they have been resolved and successfully implemented,” Dhlamini said
“Auditors should assess whether the agencies they audit have a follow up system that adequately meets their basic responsibility for resolving and implementing audit recommendations.”